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Once Again, Baltimore Police Arrest a Person For Recording Them
MobyDisk writes: A lawsuit was filed yesterday over a case in which a woman was arrested for recording the police from her car while stopped in traffic. Ars Technica writes, "Police erased the 135-second recording from the woman's phone, but it was recovered from her cloud account according to the Circuit Court for Baltimore City lawsuit, which seeks $7 million."
Baltimore police lost a similar case against Anthony Graber in 2010 and another against Christopher Sharp in 2014. The is happening so often in Baltimore that in 2012, the U.S. Department of Justice sent a letter to the police reminding them that they cannot stop recordings, and most certainly cannot delete them.
Local awareness of this issue is high since the the Mayor and the City Council support requiring police body cameras. The city council just passed a bill requiring them, but the mayor is delaying implementation until a task force determines how best to go about it. The country is also focused on police behavior in light of the recent cases in Ferguson and New York, the latter of which involved a citizen recording.
So the mayor, city council, police department policies, courts, and federal government are all telling police officers to stop doing this. Yet it continues to happen, and in a rather violent matter. What can people do to curb this problem?
Baltimore police lost a similar case against Anthony Graber in 2010 and another against Christopher Sharp in 2014. The is happening so often in Baltimore that in 2012, the U.S. Department of Justice sent a letter to the police reminding them that they cannot stop recordings, and most certainly cannot delete them.
Local awareness of this issue is high since the the Mayor and the City Council support requiring police body cameras. The city council just passed a bill requiring them, but the mayor is delaying implementation until a task force determines how best to go about it. The country is also focused on police behavior in light of the recent cases in Ferguson and New York, the latter of which involved a citizen recording.
So the mayor, city council, police department policies, courts, and federal government are all telling police officers to stop doing this. Yet it continues to happen, and in a rather violent matter. What can people do to curb this problem?
And get new ones. What's so difficult about that?
$7M paid by...The taxpayer!
No need to correct the problem when it's everyone else who pays for their mistakes.
Best solution? Encourage everyone to record every interaction with the police. This will systematically education the police on the rights of citizens.
Just like the 2nd Amendment public carry folks with a big old riffle slung over their shoulder on the sidewalk - it educated the police & public at the same time, and nobody gets hurt. (The the latter case, jimmes get russeled by some liberals, but, meh)
If theyre being recorded beating, torturing, or killing, as was the case in New York, they wont even be indicted. If they are, it just means they're acquitted later. If theyre suspended, they'll return to work after the public scrutiny latches onto something else. If they're fired, there are countless other departments that will hire them instead without so much as second-guessing their termination. Lawsuits dont seem to change the culture or nature of law enforcement in america, most citizens are simply viewed as the enemy, not those theyve been sworn to protect and serve.
Good people go to bed earlier.
You want to curb the problem? Have some high profile prosecutions.
Charge them criminally, kick them off the force, strip them of their pensions, make examples of them. It should be a felony for a police officer to do this, because they wield so much more power in this equation.
If the police aren't going to bother either learning, or following the law ... they have no business being police officers. If they can't get it through their heads they have no right to prevent this, then when they do it, bloody well lay charges.
The police are becoming thugs. And if they want to be thugs and criminals, start treating them as such.
And if the "good" cops won't stand up and get rid of the bad cops, they're just as guilty.
None of this circling the blue wall crap, and being on paid suspension. Fire the bastards.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Tough talk on the interwebs, but that's all it is.
When you're being tased, or shot, or beaten senseless only to have a group of cops all lie about what happened ... your bravado will be so much electrons and hype. And they'll circle the wagons to say it was all you, and unless someone else gets a video of it ... you'll be pretty much screwed.
I'm not saying I disagree with your assessment. I just don't think it's going to work quite so well as you seem to think.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Here in the police state of Illinois, our legislature has passed a bill, which was larded onto another, completely unrelated bill, which makes recording cops and government officials a class 3 felony, with up to 2-4 years in prison. The bill was added as an amendment to the unrelated bill, which passed with over 90% support in both chambers, essentially making it veto-proof.
It uses the word 'eavesdropping' a lot, so it may be argued that it applies only to audio; however, a chance at having a sentence like this would certainly scare off most people who would try to film the cops.
It will be interesting to see how this develops - a similar bill was struck down by the state supreme court in March, and the US supreme court has ruled that police have no expectation of privacy when they're in public, and on duty.
When you're dead, you don't know you're dead. It only affects the people around you. Same thing when you're stupid.
When the officer asks for your phone, it's easy.
SAY NO.
There. 'nuff said.
Officer: "Have you been recording me? Let me see your phone."
Person: "Officer, you may have my phone when I am presented with a signed warrant from a judge."